It's high noon at Third Avenue and Main Street, Whitehorse's busiest intersection, and Green Party candidate John Streicker is not packing surefire rhetoric, but a stack of bookmarks emblazoned with "Please vote!"

On the flipside, the bookmarks read, "The Green Party encourages you to compare all of the Yukon candidates" followed by listing of the four challengers' names and corresponding websites.

"If you're open to democracy then you'd want people to check out all the candidates and their platforms," explained Streicker. "And the more people compare, the better we do."

Just as celluloid gun slingers always faced each other in their climactic shootouts, perhaps no other Yukon candidate in this federal election has displayed such Queensbury sensibilities when engaging voters.

And it's an interesting tactic from the underdog in the coming Tuesday's federal election, but Streicker wears it with dogged determination.

"Please vote on October 14," was Streicker's mantra Monday, the phrase "for me" deftly extracted.

And Streicker's first encounter with a potential voter involved a jean-clad, cowboy hat-wearing fellow who appeared as if he had jetted in straight from Alberta's oil patch.

"I'm voting Conservative because I want to keep working," he drawled while declining Streicker's bookmark and crossing the street. "I'm too busy working to listen."

Streicker's next target, a young man in black coat and purple scarf, proved a little more positive.

"I want to know what you'd do for the community of Whitehorse," the man said.

This offered Streicker a chance to outline the Green Party's plan to raise the GST by one per cent and drive that revenue into municipal infrastructure.

Better infrastructure is great, said the young man, but what about the problem of youth homelessness?

"The first thing I'd do is lobby to build green public housing, so the person that rents it can afford to heat it," answered Streicker.

The next person Streicker engages is not so amenable to listening to his pitch or taking a bookmark, but questions the Green candidate about the need to hand out any campaign literature at all.

"You're contradicting your statement about saving trees," accuses the woman, who walks away, then returns to revisit the '60s. "I would've voted for you in my hippy days ... don't ever give up."

When the flower children of yesteryear were descending on Woodstock for the Summer of Love, the 45-year-old Streicker was just six years old.

While the '60s embraced individual exploration with community well-being relegated to an after thought, the 21st century has ushered in the global consciousness - that we're all in this together, whether we like it or not.

As the old parties attempt to reinvent themselves to appeal to a wider demographic, what lay before the Green Party is a blank slate and a chance to reinvent politics altogether.

"I'm not one of these politicians that says, 'I don't like an idea because it comes from the Conservatives or the Liberals,'" Streicker said at his campaign launch.

"The Green Party is a new kind of party that wants to take the best ideas from the left and the right and make decisions that are best for Canada."

To those frustrated with the current political regime in Ottawa, this type of promise is like music to rhetoric-weary ears. But because the Greens are a relatively new party on the Canadian scene, Streicker has had to double his efforts in getting the word out.

"I started coming out here two months ago," said Streicker, who has lived in Marsh Lake for the last 14 years. "Once you decide to do this, you recognize that you've got to be in the public light and put yourself out there."

No stranger to being in the public eye, Streicker's resume is long and varied. It includes managing the youth centre in Marsh Lake, teaching at Yukon College, writing for Encyclopedia Britanica and addressing Parliament on the subject of climate change.

But pressing the flesh on Main Street offers little time for resume reviews, however each exchange resembles an improptu job interview.

"I hope you're not pushing strategic voting," one woman challenged.

To this, Streicker replied that he "is for voting for something, rather than against something" which seemed to resonate.

"That's good," the woman replied before taking a bookmark.

Among the passing Whitehorse folk, some took Streicker's bookmarks, others engaged him, while a few kept their heads down and just walked by, one woman offered a compliment any candidate would appreciate.

"I'd like to say, 'you've got my vote,'" she declared before continuing on her way.

And it's a tone Streicker hopes will translate into a strong showing at the polls next Tuesday.